Summary:
Jim Yardley on perceptions by Chinese people of protests in Tibet and Western media coverage; underminin of Olympic Games; inflaming nationalist sentiment; China cannot be divided; Tibetan ingratitude for years of subsidies, benefits and investment (30/03/2008)
Notes:
- reaction of people: "government is being weak and cowardly," "Dalai Lama trying to separate country, not acceptable"
- Chinese officials' labelling of Dalai Lama as "jackal," "terrorist" response to people's sentiment; call for "People's War" to fight separatism of Tibet
- government trying to position itself as defender of motherland; playing to national pride and insecurities
- but Chinese people want to see tougher stance still
- China wants to present welcoming image to world, with Olympics in 5 months time
- playing nationalist card not without risk
- state media inundating public with reports from Lhasa about suffering of Han Chinese merchants and brutal deaths of Chinese citizens; no coverage about Tibetan grievances
- government fanning racial hatred?
- effect is to sharpen domestic ethnic tensions (rather than external focus, e.g. Japanese)
- government steering and inflaming nationalism, or nationalistic public attitudes beyond gov't control?
- many Chinese (home and abroad) viewing increasing attacks on China as attempt to undermine Games
- Darfur, global warming, air pollution, human rights, Taiwan, Tibet
- Tibet usually low profile issue in China, compared to e.g. Taiwan
- but many see it as attempt to split the country
- Wen Jibao: China willing to talk to Dalai Lama if he gives up desire for independence + acknowledged that Tibet and Taiwan are inseparable from China
- internet filled with angry comments about meeting between Pelosi and Dalai Lama
- "Chinese people on verge of taking to the streets"
- Tibet crisis shows leadership has stepped back into the party's harsher past
- Buddhist monks in Tibet subjected to punitive "patriotic education" campaigns
- language used is Cultural Revolution hyberbole
- propaganda machine operating in full gear
- leadership lack of confidence?
- since government has shrugged off socialist ideology and made economic development country's top priority, nationalism new state religion
- Sun Yat-sen
- Chinese revolutionary
- described country's 5 ethnic groups: Han (92%), Manchu, Hui, Mongolian and Tibetan
- "five fingers" of China; without one, country not whole
- nationalism as an ideology to keep China together
- many Chinese see Tibetan protests as attack on core identity; attack on state, but also attack on what it means to be Chinese
- Chinese nationalist sentiment inflamed by perceived Western sympathy for Tibetan protests
- anger focused on foreign media
- media perceived more sympathetic to Tibetans in Lhasa than Chinese who lost lives and property in riots
- mislabelling of photographs showing Nepalese police beating Tibetan protestors as Chinese
- but government refused to allow media into Tibet
- Chinese nationalism in past has led to violence
- cfr anti-Japanese protests; government had to intervene after first manipulating it
- for most Chinese, bottom line is you should never divide China
- little known in China about Tibet's different interpretation of its history
- regard Tibetans as having been granted special subsidies and benefits because of ethnic status
- years of building roads, high-altitude railroad and other infrastructure
- protests come across as ingratitude
- Tibetans taking advantage of Chinese tolerance towards all sorts of religions
